Cancer is a significant health problem throughout the world. Although advances have been made in detection and therapy of cancer, no vaccine or other universally successful method for prevention or treatment is currently available. For example, among women, breast and ovarian cancer are prevalent in the United States and other countries. Breast cancer, in particular, remains the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths in women, affecting more than 180,000 women in the United States each year. For women in North America, the life-time odds of getting breast cancer are now one in eight. Management of the disease currently relies on a combination of early diagnosis (through routine breast screening procedures) and aggressive treatment, which may include one or more of a variety of treatments such as surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy and hormone therapy.
Prostate cancer is the most common form of cancer among males, with an estimated incidence of 30% in men over the age of 50. Human prostate cancer has the propensity to metastasize to bone. Treatment is commonly based on surgery and/or radiation therapy, but these methods are ineffective in a significant percentage of cases, and this prevalent disease is currently the second leading cause of cancer death among men in the U.S.
To provide improved treatments for such diseases, agents that kill cancer cells are needed. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for compounds that induce apoptosis in cancer cells. The present invention fulfills this need and further provides other related advantages.